Walking with a Friend in the Dark
by Blackravens5
Summary: He sat up, eyes open and body tense. He heard quick and deep breathing then realized it was his own. Sweat droplets raced down the front of his face, and his eye's only widened more and more as he realized his state of being. He was ALIVE.


Chapter One

"Memory…is the diary we all carry about with us."

-Oscar Wilde

He sat up, eyes open and body tense. He heard quick and deep breathing then realized it was his own. Sweat droplets raced down the front of his face, and his eye's only widened more and more as he realized his state of being. In science they always tell you that there are three states of matter. A solid, which have the atoms of said solid vibrating really close together, liquid, where the atoms have a bit more room and a gas, where the atoms are pretty much able to move wherever they want. He realized that he had no idea why he was on this completely unrelated thought trail. He was ALIVE, which was strange to him. Last he had checked he was dying. He had said his goodbyes and was ready to meet Charon once again.

So why was he here? In the middle of a forest. He sat there for a good thirty minutes just trying to comprehend the meaning of what is going on. After a while he realized that he needed to get up and try to find out where he is.

He chose a direction and started walking, never stopping, for hours on end until he felt like his legs would give out. He pressed forward still, until he smelt something. He thought he smelt gas, not like the gas at a gas station, but like natural gas. He followed the stench back to its source and what he saw scared him more than anything ever had before.

He backed up, too shocked to do anything else. His legs finally gave away and he crashed to the ground. His eyes wide toward the ground in front of him, he started to cry.

_Why, why, oh god why? What is this? Wha-WHAT THE HELL IS THIS?!_

He looked up, and immediately wished he didn't. He found strength somewhere within him and got up, turned and ran. He felt like he had ran an hour when he came upon the exact same thing he had seen before. Once again, he fell to the ground, he was still crying, but at this point he had forgotten his tears. He leaned forward and released the contents of his stomach onto the ground in front of him, adding more to the already soggy ground.

"What's going on?" he mumbled to himself.

"What do you think happened?" A musical, yet flat and dead, voice said behind him. He whipped around, attempting to see the body in which the voice originated. What he saw made him freeze. It was a woman, the most beautiful women he had ever laid eyes on. She stood around five foot and three inches, with slightly pail skin and a black haired pixie cut. She had gorgeous green eyes, with flakes of gold in them. He knew this woman, he had known her for most of both their lives, just as she had him. But seeing her, he knew, something was very, very wrong. For she stood there, in skinny jeans and a white blouse, head cocked to one side like a puppet, her eyes unseeing, and completely covered in blood.

"A-Am-Amie!?" he stuttered, shock still covering his face, "Amie, what the hell is going on?! Are you alright? Why are you covered in blood!? Amie, answer me!"

A smile graced her face, but it never reached her, unseeing -uncaring- eyes. "What do you think happened? It's quite simple. I knew you were slow, but even you must have figured it out by now." She lifted her head, only to let it fall behind her as she laughed. Though her body did not tremble like most bodies do while laughing. It remained tauntingly still. "It's so simple, don't you see? I DIED!" She didn't laugh as her head came back up to stare at him. He voice, no longer dead and monotone, but accusing instead. "They killed us all. Butchered us like animals at a slaughterhouse." She smiled as if remembering a fond memory. "And we let them."

"Wha-What do you mean? Who killed you? How are you dead? You're talking to me, how are you dead?!" He was confused, scared and angry. _She can't be dead, you know she can't, you just saw her today, and she's talking to you now. It's all a bad dream! But that smell, it's too real, it can't be dream with such a putrid smell. _

"Oh you've almost figured it out. I'll help since I doubt you'd be able to make sense of it otherwise." Amie said, "You're not dreaming, but you're not conscious either."

"What she is trying to say," another very familiar voice said to his left, "is that you finally died." He searched his memory for this new yet very old voice, he knew this voice. He should, he had known this voice since he was twelve. "But you cannot move on."

"What? I died? What are you talking about? I haven't died. I couldn't have. How could I have possibly have died?"

"War," the new voice said simply. He couldn't quite place where he knew the new voice, from, simply that he had known this person since he was twelve. "Don't you remember?"

I looked at the owner of this new voice. A man wearing dirty white and black converse, black jeans, a white t-shirt, and an open black leather jacket. He had medium length, sandy blonde hair, peeking out from under a black beanie. His eyes though, were what really made him stand out in a crowd.

They were pitch black.

"Duncan?" He as starting to get really confused, but was glad that he could talk to people he knew. Then what Duncan said started to sink it. "War? What war? I never fought in a war."

"Oh yes you did!" Amie exclaimed.

"Look behind you, you did that." Duncan all but ordered him.

He remembered the scene he had come across before and tried to escape from, before coming across it again. He felt sick just looking at it. He shook his head, not wanting to see it again. "That wasn't me, I couldn't have done that! You're lying!" He accused them

"He really doesn't remember, D." Amie sighed. "What do you remember?" She addressed him.

"What?" He asked, still confused. "I- "he stopped, drawing a blank. He remembered them, of course, but other than that, nothing. He couldn't remember anything. His eyes went wide, and he started choking in fear.

He couldn't remember anything. He searched, his mind, but came up with nothing.

"What happened? Why can't I remember anything?" he asked despairingly.

"You died. We all did, everything and everyone. You saw the end of the world. Who knew it was going to be in Alaska? I certainly wouldn't have bet money on it." Duncan told him.

Alaska, that's he was. No wonder it was so cold. The sky so black, yet it had been so for too long.

"You keep saying I died. How can that be when I am here, talking to you?"

"That's simple, you died and then you came back. We did the same. It's hard to kill an immortal forever after all. It's in the definition of immortality." Duncan stated with boredom.

"Still, I don't think I ever envisioned seeing the world after its end." Amie said.

"Did you think you'd fade before now, _Nyx_?" Duncan asked, using Amie's real name accusingly.

"Shut up, Erebus! You know I don't like using my given name."

By this point, he was beyond confusion. _Erebus? Nyx? _

"Whatever, come _Thanatos_, we have to go, we have a lot to talk about." Duncan said as he turned his back to them and walking into the woods. Amie close behind him. He, Thanatos, as he remembered now that Duncan had said it, took one last look behind him.

He wished he hadn't.

He bolted after Duncan and Amie, suppressing the urge to vomit as he went.

He would never forget what he saw there, even if he tried to.

After all, how does one forget something like that?

A field full of _thousands_ of corpses. _Human_ corpses.


End file.
